UN says still waiting for Iran nuclear data

Iranian President Mohammad Khatami has insisted that Tehran will provide whatever cooperation is needed by an Oct. 31 deadline set by the U.N.’s International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to prove its nuclear program is solely geared for peaceful purposes.

But ElBaradei said the amount and flow of information remained inadequate.

"They’ve promised information will be forthcoming but it has not yet been provided," he told the paper in an interview.

"The central question is whether Iran has any (uranium) enrichment activities that we have not yet been informed about. On that question I haven’t got satisfactory information."

U.S. Undersecretary of State John Bolton predicted on Thursday that Iran would show some cooperation to prevent a showdown over the deadline but not enough to dispel international suspicion of its nuclear ambitions.

"They will try and throw sand in our eyes and use a modest level of cooperation to hide some level of obfuscation and lack of cooperation, to conceal as much as they can, to delay, to fight for time, and to avoid having the issue referred to the (U.N.) Security Council," he told reporters in London.

ElBaradei has warned Tehran that if it fails to cooperate fully with his agency Iran’s case may be sent to the Security Council for possible sanctions.

Iran insists its nuclear program is solely geared to producing electricity and not for building an atomic arms capability, as Washington alleges.